Ultimate Ghosts 'N Goblins Review

Arthur kicks some serious ghoul behind, no quarters needed.

Ultimate Ghosts 'N Goblins, the 3D homage to Capcom's classic medieval franchise, is exactly the type of game retro fans will go crazy for. Why? Because it does two things extremely well: 1.) It successfully captures the spirit of a series that helped make Capcom a household name in the 1980s, and 2.) It takes what's an otherwise-ancient gameplay design and updates it with fantastic graphics, easy accessibility, and a couple of new twists. In other words, Ghosts 'N Goblins is a great source of old-school fun.

Now in the off chance you've never played a Ghosts 'N Goblins game before, there really isn't a whole lot to catch up on. Players assume the role of Arthur, a boxer shorts-wearing knight who spends most of his free time side-scrolling through the most hellish, monster-infested environments this side of a used car lot. In Ultimate GNG, the new and mysterious ruler of the Dark Realm has destroyed a royal castle and kidnapped the princess so that his minions may mix their blood with her majestic lineage. Not one to support the idea of demonic roofies, Arthur sets out on his quest to destroy the evil ruler and reclaim the hijacked lady.

The quest itself is rather straightforward, but in truth, that's what makes it enjoyable. Like other classic arcade adaptations such as Gradius or Final Fight, Ultimate Ghosts 'N Goblins is about pushing the action forward first and foremost with everything else coming second. There isn't a single moment in GNG where players will stand still. Between the unending battles with the game's various henchmen, its impressive bosses, the constantly-changing environments, or the multitude of platforming challenges, there's always something to overcome.... or to put it a better way, to survive.

Of course, a lot has been made about how hard Ultimate Ghosts 'N Goblins is to complete but if you managed to play through other toughies like God of War or Devil May Cry 3, it won't be any more difficult than those two. In truth, only the "Ultimate Mode" will truly test your patience as the other two settings, Novice and Standard, are a lot more balanced and can be completed with average skills in roughly four to eight hours. What I particularly appreciate about this sort of balancing is that the three challenge levels aren't just a matter of "adding enemies here" or "throwing in fewer power-ups there" -- the mode differences were given a lot more respect than that.

Take the Novice Mode, for example. When playing through that, users begin the game with more lives but are also knocked backwards less of a distance when attacked. Additionally, powered-up weapons will also retain their extra strength when players spawn back to life. When playing through Standard Mode, however, users will only start the game with two lives before having to continue again without the aforementioned benefits of Novice. If you get enough guts to play through Ultimate Mode, though, that's where the trouble really hits -- as all your armor breaks after only a single hit and if you die, you don't respawn from the point you died... you respawn at the very beginning of the stage.

One area in which your skills will be tested regardless of your settings, though, is with the control itself. Always a sticking point in the series, Arthur's jumping abilities and somewhat stiff forward movement is still in issue in Ultimate Ghosts 'N Goblins as well. After years of exposure to other action games, you'd think Capcom would finally want to fix the somewhat robotic movement of its armor-wearing hero but it hasn't. I'm not sure if this is out of nostalgia or if it's an easy method of making the game harder, but either way, it will definitely take some getting used to for those accustomed to having finer control of their onscreen characters.

But just because Capcom hasn't fixed Ghosts 'N Goblins controls after all these years, it doesn't mean that the company hasn't added benefits in other areas. Arthur's repertoire of moves, for instance, is as deep as it has ever been. As players progress they'll be able to perform all sorts of different maneuvers that the series has never seen before, like dashing forward to avoid sudden enemy strikes or grabbing the ends of ledges to keep from falling into pits. Other new abilities, like the option drop down or climb up from the hanging position, pull out a shield to protect yourself, or even jump up into the air to hover momentarily have also been included.